


In the Details

by okapi



Series: The Cup 'verse (Vampire Femlock) [3]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood Drinking, Cunnilingus, F/F, Fluff and Smut, Gender or Sex Swap, Sexual Roleplay, Vampire Mycroft, Vampire Sherlock, minor character death (off screen)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-22
Updated: 2016-07-10
Packaged: 2018-07-16 16:18:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7275067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/okapi/pseuds/okapi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The devil comes to Baker Street and makes trouble for John and Vampire Sherlock. Rating for final chapter.</p><p>Part of <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/5070031/chapters/11658898">The Cup that Runneth Over</a> 'verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This story is a re-telling of the Biblical story of the temptation of Christ (Matthew 4:1-11).
> 
> There are many references to [The Cup that Runneth Over](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5070031/chapters/11658898) and [Red Christmas](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5347379) in this fic. The former is a non-con fic which includes kidnapping, physical and sexual assault, murder and confinement to a psychiatric facility. There are references to all these things in this fic but no graphic depictions of them. Also, there are references to menstrual blood drinking.

“Doctor Watson has not been in residence for,” Mycroft sniffed the air, “seven days. You allowed her to leave?”

“Allowed? She is not my thrall! Nor is she my child, pupil, ward, or prisoner. Her sister took gravely ill and is in hospital. As she is John’s only living relation, it is only natural and sensible that John should be by her side.”

“You are in contact with John?”

“She has alerted me to the deterioration of her sister’s condition and the need to postpone her return via text.”

Mycroft smoothed a hand down the front of her buttoned suit jacket. “Have you returned these texts?” The final word was pronounced with all the crispness of an autumn morn.

Sherlock’s only reply was to pluck discordant notes from her violin.

“Ah,” said Mycroft. “Have you eaten?”

Sherlock snorted and set the violin down beside her. “Not all of our kind need glut ourselves!” she snapped, then added softly, “I prefer John’s blood. At the time of her menses, if you must know. Given freely! And with mutual pleasure!” The last two exclamations were strident, even to Sherlock’s ears.

Mycroft studied the handle of her umbrella thoughtfully. “You say that John is not your thrall or your prisoner, but you _did_ assault her, that is to say, you drew her blood under false pretenses while she was in hospital—“

Sherlock growled. “That was ages ago. She’s not still upset.”

“—Nine months. Is that so long? Let’s see, then you murdered the patient in the bed next to her—“

Sherlock sprang to her feet. “She was a thrall! And she attacked John! Good riddance!”

“Then you proceeded to kidnap John, imprison her, sexually assault her—“

Sherlock winced.

“—and abandon her, bound and bleeding.”

“I found her.”

“And from that time, she’s been living here, under your _care_.”

Sherlock echoed Mycroft’s condescending tone. “And under my _care_ , her physical strength is near restored. She hardly uses a cane now. She does locum work at the surgery in addition to accompanying me on cases. She is not my captive, Mycroft, she is my flatmate, my lover, my partner. Why at Christmas—”

“I do remember Christmas, but I also remember her confinement to a psychiatric facility following her escape from captivity. The same cell where she sleeps.” Mycroft gestured towards the stairs leading to the upstairs bedroom. “Is it any wonder that her absence is protracted? And her communication terse?” She turned her head and addressed the lamp. “Why do they call it _Stockholm_ Syndrome? Must remember to look it up later. Well, I’m sure she’ll return in due time.” She got to her feet.

“Leave,” said Sherlock.

Mycroft left.

* * *

“Leave.”

Mycroft sniffed. “Fourteen days.”

“Harry died. All responsibilities fall on John. She has many things to settle, arrange.”

“Ah, yes. The funeral. Will you attend?”

“I suppose she’ll be cremated.”

Mycroft nodded. “You suppose.” She pulled her jacket tighter around her. “Unseasonable cool, isn’t it?”

“How would I know?”

* * *

“LEAVE!”

“I’ve seen John.”

Sherlock stared at the envelope.

“She asked me to give you this.”

Sherlock shook her head.

“No. John is many things, but she is not a coward. She would face me if she were breaking off our, our…”

“Your what? I’m sorry, Sherlock. But it was a fairy tale to think that a human would willingly remain chained to your side—“

“I DO NOT WANT OR NEED A THRALL!”

“No, you need a docile cow to milk every twenty-eight days,” hissed Mycroft. She paused, then took a deep breath, fiddling with the buttons on her suit jacket as she continued. “And I believe that you’re mistaken. It was not cowardice, but a wise sense of self-preservation that prompted Doctor Watson to write that letter. She knows all too well your violence. You wielded it against her before, perhaps she thinks she stands a chance of surviving if she does not convey her decision in person.”

“I would not, will not, hurt her.”

Mycroft chuckled. “Do drop by when you’re peckish. We can hunt together. Just like old times. What, say, in about a week?”

“LEAVE!”

Mycroft left.

* * *

_Dear Sherlock,_

_Our time together was extraordinary. You are extraordinary. But with every day away from Baker Street, I am drawn more and more to the idea of an ordinary life, the life I had before the car accident, before Afghanistan, before I met you. Harry’s death is yet another reminder of how fleeting and precious life, at least human life, is. And it has made me reconsider what I want for myself. I have come to the conclusion that I want to be independent, free to explore, free to forge a new path for myself, new friends, a new home…_

Sherlock let the page drop to the floor. She stood abruptly and began to pace.

She would confront John. She would hear those horrid, insipid words said to her face.

She would not confront John. She would never see John again.

She would forget John, throw herself back into cases, into experiments, into nightwalker life.

She would hunt.

She would starve herself to death.

Whatever she did, she would not cry. And she would not remember the taste of John on her lips, she would not remember her cries of pleasure or the way she hummed when she made tea. She would not remember how John had surprised her, recreating a Victorian Christmas just so that Sherlock could enjoy the one that she missed the winter that she became a vampire.

Though Sherlock would never admit it aloud, Mycroft was right. She had done unforgivable things to John, and it was logical that with time away and distance from Baker Street, John should see those things for what they were and change her mind about their living arrangements. And about Sherlock.

Forge a new path.

Move on.

Sherlock raced down the hall, threw off her dressing gown, and crawled into her coffin, drawing the lid closed with a thud.

She would sleep.

* * *

“Sherlock, don’t be foolish!”

“Go away, Mycroft.”

“You look more witch than vampire, with your grizzled grey hair and positively translucent skin. Let’s feed. Turn water into wine and wine into blood, stones into bread, the whole lot. You’re starving. Don’t destroy yourself when there’s prey to be hunted. You enjoyed it once, and the game is still afoot!”

“Go away!”

Mycroft sighed and rubbed her face with her hand. Then she turned her head.

“Those two boxes by the stairs.”

“John’s things.”

“Shall I deliver them?”

“Yes. If you will leave with them!”

Mycroft left.

* * *

“Get up,” said Mycroft with a snarl. “Put this on.” She threw a heavy cloak atop Sherlock’s huddled form. “We’re going out.”

Mycroft strode slowly. Sherlock shuffled, bare-foot, with her head down and cloak pulled tightly about her. Passersby walked around and through them, unawares.

“You are wantonly, needlessly hurting yourself,” said Mycroft. “So one human in these,” she stretched out her arms, “millions rejects to live in the precise manner that you wish, so what? There are armies of thralls, servants, nay, call them angels, ready to do your bidding, service you in any way, pure or lecherous, that you desire, protect you from all harm, bear you up, lest you dash your foot against the stone, etcetera, etcetera. This wallowing is beneath you, Sherlock.”

“The world bores me,” mumbled Sherlock. “I want John.”

“You’re pathetic. A few more days of these histrionics and you’ll be too weak to stand.”

"Leave. I'm going back to Baker Street."

* * *

The great clock behind them began to chime midnight.

“All this, Sherlock,” Mycroft swung her arm wide, the gesture encompassing all of the city below, “could be ours. If you will throw off your sorrow and begin anew.”

“All right,” breathed Sherlock. She was balanced precariously on the edge of the parapet, a jumble of bones and crepe paper skin wrapped in a threadbare shroud. “But I want to return to Baker Street. Shower. Dress. Ready myself for the hunt.”

Mycroft clapped her hands together. “Capital!” she cried. “As you wish.”

In an instant, they were back at Baker Street.

Sherlock let the shroud fall.

Mycroft gave a satisfied sigh. “I’ll sit and wait for you.” She unbuttoned her suit jacket and settled herself into the armchair.

John’s armchair, Sherlock noted. Then she stopped as her eye caught on something.

The gold buttons of Mycroft’s waistcoat.

The gold chain of Mycroft’s watch draped across her stomach. From pocket to pocket.

There were footsteps on the stairs and a voice. “Sherlock?”

Sherlock approached the figure in the armchair, grinning maniacally, nostrils flared. She extended one finger toward the chain.

“The devil _is_ apparent in the details,” she said.

“Indeed,” agreed a voice behind her. “I’ve never worn a double Albert chain in my life—or my undeath.”

And in a flash, the figure in the armchair shed its Mycroft skin. Sherlock let her rage fill her and transformed into a hideous figure of scraggly hair, crooked nose, sunken eye sockets, and twisted mouth with fangs as long and sharp as the claws that sprung from fingers. There was a faint whoosh behind her and she knew that Mycroft—the real Mycroft—had done the same.

The two vampires spoke as one.

“ _GET THEE HENCE, SATAN!_ ”

An onlooker gazing up at the windows of 221B from the street below would’ve have been amazed at the spectacle within: a cloud of swirling black smoke surrounded by two grey ones. Thunder cracked and lightning flashed inside the domicile.

The storm raged.

“What have you done with John?!” shrieked Sherlock as she lunged, fangs and claws drawn. “If you’ve killed her…”

The horned figure rose to its full height and cackled.

“Stupid! I do not need to kill them! I talk to them and the hopeless, hapless, lost creatures kill themselves. I thought you were different. I wanted you for my own, my army. Why you could’ve been a general! Commanded legions of demons! Reigned over great kingdoms if you would just surrender this pathetic notion.”

“I want John!” cried Sherlock.

“Ugh! John, John, John! For what?”

“For love!”

“And you would sacrifice all that I can provide for this feeling, this sentiment! That will never be returned! Never be fulfilled!”

“Yes!”

“As would I,” said Mycroft, her voice barely discernable over the smashing furniture and the ring of fire that had spontaneously erupted around the three of them. "Even though I am not party to it."

“You miserable creatures, you’re so boring. On the side of the angels!”

“But we are not of them!” cried Mycroft, launching herself at the figure. “Go, Sherlock!”

“AAARGH!”

_BAM-BAM!_

Suddenly, all was quiet and still.

Sherlock opened her eyes. She was on the floor, on her back, looking up at the singed ceiling. She turned her head.

“Mycroft, are we dead?”

Mycroft groaned. “No more so than before, Sherlock.”

“Moriarty.”

“Yes.”

“Gone.”

“Yes. ‘Then the devil leaveth him.’”

“Ugh! Now is not the time to show off your Scripture knowledge!” Sherlock pushed herself to sitting and surveyed the utter destruction of the flat. It smelled of sulphur and cinders. Then her world went white and she fell back onto the floorboards.

“You’re too weak, Sherlock.”

“Find John.”

“Yes.” There was a rustling and a creaking and a groaning and a swearing.

“Mycroft?”

“Hmm?”

“Where have you been all this time?”

Mycroft laughed. “I told you at Christmas I wanted to do some research on a certain topic. Things were quiet so I decided to take my leave. My studies took me much farther and wider than anticipated.”

Sherlock snorted. “You take a sabbatical, and the Devil comes to Baker Street.”

“The irony is not lost on me.”

“It never is.” Sherlock began to wheeze and cough. “Find her, Mycroft.”

“Yes.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The reunion.

“Not tonight,” vowed John. “I’m not going to look at that bloody Christmas ornament or read that stupid letter again.”

Tonight she would leave the ornament just as it had arrived, nestled in the box of jumpers and jeans that Mycroft had delivered. The ornament had been Sherlock’s gift to John at Christmas, well, Epiphany, to be precise, engraved with the words ‘my little thief’ along the base. John imagined that she could still feel the puff of breath the words made against her skin.

John had believed that things would always be as they were, that her bond with Sherlock was unbreakable.

Foolish. The letter told her just how foolish.

John didn’t actually need to read Sherlock’s words again. She knew them all.

_Dear John,_

_I send my condolences on the loss of your sister. It does not please me to burden you with further grief at this time, but with every passing day I feel drawn to my former life as a lone hunter. I confess I have indulged my feral tendencies and have subsequently found them growing stronger and stronger. I am hunting often now, and yes, feeding on prey as my instincts plead. As continued residence at Baker Street would put your very life in danger, I am entrusting the return of your belongings to Mycroft…_

Sherlock _was_ a vampire. The rest—solving crimes, experiments, John—was pastime, fun, hobby.

Diversion.

It was expected that Sherlock would eventually return to her primal ways, to lean into the forces that made her, to hunt and feed the way that was, well, natural for her.

John’s menses had come and gone. She’d wept every day of it.

But she had to keep moving. She had to—

_Knock! Knock!_

John frowned. Mycroft looked grave, even for a vampire.

“John, I haven’t time to explain, but Sherlock is dying. You and she have been deceived. Any communication that you’ve received from her about the dissolution of your understanding or loss of sentiment is false.”

“Wait, _you_ brought me the letter.”

Mycroft opened her jacket. “My one allowance for asymmetry is my watch chain. Did the spectre of me that visited you have a single chain or a double one?”

John shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t know that you—it—even took off its coat.”

“You gave me an antique umbrella for Christmas. It was the first gift I’d received in more than one hundred years.” Mycroft walked passed John to an open box and drew out the ornament. “Sherlock gave you this on her birthday.” She turned it over. “She calls you her ‘little thief’ because you stole her heart.”

“She wouldn’t tell you that,” John retorted.

Mycroft smiled. “She doesn’t need to. She was always the romantic one. You were deceived. The devil came to Baker Street, too.”

John laughed. “The what? I thought you said spectre. It was the devil, the actual devil? Horns, point tail, pitch-fork, that lot?”

Mycroft’s smiled faded. “I haven’t time, we—you and I—do not have time. Sherlock’s dying. I’ve been away on a personal matter and returned just as she realised the deception that was being perpetrated on her—and you. She and I bested our foe, but she was very weak even before the fight because she hadn’t…”

“Fed,” said John, a sinking feeling grew in her stomach.

Mycroft nodded. “She got a letter, too. From you. Delivered by the devil incarnated as me.”

John snorted. “Devil in a Mycroft suit?”

“With slightly different taste in accessories,” said Mycroft, fingering the watch chain. “The letter said that you didn’t want her.”

“And she believed it?!”

Mycroft sighed. “It’s very easy for her to believe. Frankly, it’s quite easy for me to believe as well. The alternative is so very highly improbable. Will you come?”

John nodded and extended her hand. “Take me there.”

* * *

“Sherlock!”

John took one glance at the mass of skin and bones on the floor and ran towards the kitchen. When she returned, she dropped to the floor. 

“When did you last feed, Mycroft?” asked John, shoving her jeans and pants half-way down her legs.

“I keep a regulated schedule of…”

“You can handle this?” John put the large knife to the crease of her pelvis.

“Of course,” said Mycroft.

“All right, love. Here we go.” John put her thigh next to Sherlock’s head and thrust the knife into her own body. She screamed, then pressed the spurting stream to Sherlock’s lips.

“Drink, love,” she whispered.

“John, you could bleed out in minutes,” warned Mycroft.

“She won’t let that happen. No one cares about my continued blood supply more than Sherlock. Not even me.”

John watched Sherlock’s lips quiver, then purse, then drink; watched her hair turn from grey to black; watched her skin plump like an inflated balloon and her limbs uncurl like morning flowers greeting the dawn.

In seconds, the room was spinning around John. She felt Sherlock’s tongue inside her leg, then on the surface of her skin, clamping, soldering, repairing, healing.

John collapsed on the floor beside Sherlock, dizzy and weak but relieved at the strength in Sherlock’s tone when she said,

“John.”

John rolled onto her side. She met Sherlock’s gaze.

“I didn’t leave you. Harry was sick, got sicker, died.” John’s voice sounded hollow, even to her own ears. “It took a long time to sort through all the messes she left behind so I stayed at her place. Meanwhile, Mycroft arrived with a letter from you.” As she spoke, she re-dressed herself, pulling up her pants and trousers and fastening the latter.

“It wasn’t from me. And that wasn’t Mycroft.”

“Certainly not,” said Mycroft. “To paraphrase: sartorial choices maketh the nightwalker; or an accessory is all that separates the devil from his handmaiden.”

John giggled and turned her head to look at Mycroft, who was still standing in the doorway. “You may not be an angel, Mycroft Holmes, but you’re certainly not the devil’s handmaiden. You wouldn’t have brought me here if you were.”

Mycroft hesitated, then gave a conceding nod.

John turned back to Sherlock. “How could you believe that I didn’t want you?”

“How could you believe the same about me?”

They stared at each other.

Then Sherlock sat up. She shivered.

“You two fought the devil. And won.” John looked from Sherlock to Mycroft as she slowly got her feet. “Quite the team.” She wobbled as she retrieved a blanket from the sofa and draped it around Sherlock.

“Mycroft said that you haven’t eaten since I left.”

Sherlock shook her head.

“Will you need more before I bleed? I’m not due for some days.”

“I’m fine. What you provided was sufficient. Thank you, by the way.”

“I could always draw some extra as I did at Christmas. Or I suppose you could take it the old-fashioned way.”

Sherlock’s eyes widened. “Biting?”

“I am assuming that you have ways of making it painless.”

A grin bloomed on Sherlock’s lips. “I have ways of making it ecstasy, John.”

“Temporary ways,” clarified John.

Sherlock nodded. Her eyes became the colour of liquid mercury, and she closed the distance between them.

John said in husky voice, “Your favourite cocktail.” She stared at Sherlock’s mouth as it formed words and drew closer.

 “Your orgasm and your blood, John. Your little whimpered pleas are just the garnish.”

“Ah-hem.”

John blinked. “Oh, God! Mycroft.”

“No. Not the devil nor the rival. Better wardrobe than both, for starters, but I’m flattered.” Her eyes shifted. “Sherlock, I think you will find the results of my research sabbatical interesting, but perhaps now is not the time.”

“Thank you for that gift of understatement. I shall treasure it always,” replied Sherlock dryly.

“Sherlock, Doctor Watson.” Mycroft gave a tip of an invisible hat.

“Thank you!” called John at the footsteps down the stairs.

“Now where were we?” asked Sherlock.

“In the middle of a,” John looked around at the destroyed flat, “battlefield, contemplating a post-war reunion.”

Sherlock hummed.

“Along with setting the flat to rights, Sherlock, we will need to talk and make sure that this kind of misunderstanding doesn’t happen again. The letters may have been manufactured but they played on our very real fears. We need to be stronger.”

“Beat the devil at his own game?”

John nodded. “Something like that.”

Sherlock reached up and cupped John’s jaw, pulled her close, and kissed her.

“I love you, John. How’s that?”

“It’s a start,” said John with a grin.  “I love you, too, Sherlock. Now,” she looked around them, “we’ve got until dawn to get this place livable again. Or—devil or no devil—there’ll be a troll to pay.”

They both looked toward the floor and giggled.

"We really shouldn't talk about the landlord like that."

"But he is a troll."


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock and John share a vampire kiss.

“It’s a lovely peignoir.”

Ah. So that was how you pronounced it.

It wasn’t lovely, but it was white and flowy and, most importantly, cheap.

“Do you need a gift-box?”

“No, thank you.” John wisely left the addendum ‘Because my vampire girlfriend and I are playing naughty Nosferatu tonight’ unspoken. 

* * *

The sun was setting when John returned to the flat.

Sherlock greeted her with a Count Orlock pose and a Transylvania-by-way-of-old-Hollywood cry.

“I _v-ahn-t_ to suck your _bl-ah-d_!”

John laughed.

“Warming up.” Sherlock brushed her hands down the front of her dark suit. “Getting into character.”

“Speaking of, my damsel-in-distress costume,” said John.

Sherlock eyed the shopping bag.

“No deductions, Sherlock. You’ll ruin the surprise.” John kissed Sherlock’s pouting lips. “I’m going to eat, then retire.”

Sherlock’s voice was an ominous cackle. “Who knows what lurks in the shadows, John?”

“True. Should leave my bedroom door ajar, just in case.”

* * *

John closed her eyes.

Boots on the stairs. Creak of the door. A sigh and a puff of breath.

The rumbling, dark voice of a stage villain.

“Lovely.”

Boots circling the bed slowly.

“Like a spectre. Or a sacrifice. Something translucent, innocent, pure, about to be ravaged, consumed, bloodied.”

The words should not have made John wet. They did.

She lay posed on the bed as Sherlock’s voice travelled around her.

“But first, a feast for the eyes, and the fingers, and the tongue. And then, when you are on the cusp of releasing those delectable dew-drops, only then, will I bite. I am not a monster. I am a connoisseur. And I want, and I mean to have, only the best.”

A weight on the bed.

“Let’s see.”

A single-pointed scratch from cleavage southwards.

Claw.

Sherlock was splitting the fitted bodice of the gown, from the nadir of the V neckline to John’s navel, with her claw.

Cool air on nipples. John’s breath quickened.

“Lovely. Begging to be fondled, caressed. What do you dream of, little one? I daresay not what I dream of. I dream of breasts that give blood.”

The words should not have prompted John to arch her back, lift her chest, drink in Sherlock’s unseen gaze, but she did.

“Breasts that I could suckle, lovingly, worshipfully. Breasts from which I could feed.”

Sherlock’s mouth covered John’s nipple. John opened her mouth in a silent gasp at the wet heat and the greedy suction and the intimate, so intimate, touch.

Sherlock moved to the other breast, then nuzzled John’s cleavage. “No matter,” she whispered. “Cunts are glorious, too.”

Warmth, wetness, softness around John’s navel. Directly on her skin, indirectly through the thin fabric.

“Prudent to not invest,” murmured Sherlock, in her own matter-of-fact voice. Her tongue pushed beneath the flimsy material. She hummed. “Delicious.”

A shift of weight. A sharp tug. The brush of a hand on breast.

The wicked sensation of being exposed.

“Better. If I wasn’t so very desperate for the taste of your cunt, I would adore both as they deserve, but…”

Sherlock sighed.

Fabric pulled taut. Another scratch from ribs to ankle. A delicious ripping.

Cool air and warm gaze on leg, buttock, hair.

“Oh.” Sherlock’s voice was strained. “Already the seductor is forgetting lines, abandoning role, in favour of playing the part of seduced.”

The curtain fell.

John’s eyes flew open.  

On her back.

Gown gone.

Sherlock’s tongue. Inside.

“Sherlock!”

John bent her knees and lifted her hips; Sherlock hooked John’s legs over her shoulders and plunged her tongue even deeper.

Sherlock was not playing a part anymore? Well neither was John. She gripped Sherlock’s head with two hands and jerked it back. “You will feed from me and me only for the rest of my days.” Her voice was steel; it had never been this hard, not even in a warzone.

Sherlock looked up with eyes round like saucers; pupils blown black; face wet; mouth hanging open.

“I swear.”

A puff of breath tickled John’s cunt.

“On penalty of death?”

The tiniest of smiles flitted across Sherlock’s lips. “There is no other kind of swearing, John.”

John bowed her head, and Sherlock crashed into the very core of her.

Sherlock was relentless, yet John demanded more.  

Deeper, harder, closer.

Inside, inside me, crawl inside me!

Now!

Sherlock flipped them, and John slammed her hips into Sherlock. Looking down, she had the fleeting thought that were Sherlock not immortal, she surely would be dying from lack of air at very moment.

The tension in John’s body built. Release was just within her grasp and then—

“John!”

That was the only warning she had.

Four pin-pricks to her neck.

And she was rocketing into the sky.

Not dream, not fantasy.

Folded together as one, they shot straight up through ceiling, roof, into the night sky. Past windows aglow and spiral peaks. Past stars and moon into darkness.

Like a child’s swing.

Up, up, up.

They hovered in space for the length of a kiss.

Down, down, down.

John’s stomach lurched. She shouted the entire return journey, a long continuous “Oooh!” as they plummeted, and she did not close her mouth until they landed back in the bed. Together.

“SHERLOCK!”

Sherlock laughed. And laughed.

She laughed so hard that she let John slip out of her embrace and slide onto the bed beside her.

John laughed with her. After a while, she asked, “How much blood did you drink?”

Sherlock rolled to face her. “A mere swallow.”

“That’s all?” But somehow John believed it. She didn’t feel any change physically, certainly not the light-headedness of the rescue feed.

“That was a vampire kiss, John. We kiss with our full bodies. And yours.”

John sighed. “What a way to kiss!”

* * *

“What’s this all about, Sherlock? I pried up the floorboard in your bedroom and found the box. You know, rooting around in a room with a coffin is not my idea of a good time.”

“It’s important, John.”

“Yeah, I got that.”

“Stay where you are.” John stopped in the hallway. Sherlock stood by the windows. “Open it.”

“A silver chain. Necklace?”

“Of sorts. It’s a vampire-killer.”

“What? I thought you were immortal!”

“On the inside of the chain there is an inscription.”

John squinted. “I don’t know…”

“Three words in a dead language. They are the names of herbs, herbs which are difficult, but not impossible, to find these days. Centuries ago, the chain was steeped in the essences of the three herbs while it was being forged. If you throw it on me—or any vampire—you render us mortal, and thus, extinguishable by any means that would kill a human. It’s my gift to you.”

“How did you come by this, Sherlock?”

“That is not my story to tell.”

John stared at her. “Mycroft.”

Sherlock said nothing.

John fingered the chain. “You’re giving me the power to kill you.”

“You have that power with or without the chain, John. You have put such faith in me, I only want to demonstrate through the most concrete means afforded to me, that I have an equal amount of faith in you. In us. You will keep it safe. Me, safe.”

“Always, Sherlock. No devil will come between us again.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
